


that time jake english was kidnapped by the russian mafia

by yawnbot



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Kidnapping, Light Bondage, M/M, Meet-Cute, dirk tries to be cool, its all a joke, its all a meet cute everything is fine, jake english is a dumbass, kind of. if you squint.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-18 06:43:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21590206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yawnbot/pseuds/yawnbot
Summary: “You could have a bit more dramatic flair, you know. This is my first time. It should be special, yeah?” you hear yourself saying, your unnatural, non-regional accent slurring your words into an odd, drunken slush. It’s out-of-body, you’re actually not really one to keep your cool in situations such as these, but you’re proud that it comes out just as you’d always practiced. Calm and collected, unaffected like an action movie hero. Score one for you.
Relationships: Jake English/Dirk Strider
Comments: 5
Kudos: 42





	that time jake english was kidnapped by the russian mafia

You awaken with your hands bound behind your back, strung up to the wall at shoulder level, your entire body weight leaning forward and hanging from your wrists. There is an incredibly uncomfortable strain in your shoulders, the muscles and tendons pulled taut like weak rubber bands seconds away from snapping. The entire upper half of your torso is sore, throbbing with a burning, tight pain in your core and back. Blinking open your eyes is a chore, dizzying and stinging as you pry the lids apart. It’s quite shocking to find yourself in an unfamiliar room. You almost wish you had remained unconscious, or asleep, or in whatever stasis you were in before you were aware of your predicament. Above your head are harsh fluorescent lights, and below you is an uncomfortable bed, the mattress of which feels thin and plastic against your bare calves — like the sort you may find in a college dormitory or perhaps a prison. You look around wearily, your blurred vision adjusting enough to the brightness of the room to take in the barren furniture: a well-worn chest of drawers, a couple of dated posters, a messy closet, and a stained, battered carpet.

Now having your bearings, you fancy a go at your bindings. You flex and pull your wrists apart, testing the strength of what must be a belt restricting them. What you assume is the belt’s buckle jangles and clicks as you pull, but sore and contorted as you are you can’t seem to maneuver it in such a way as to unbuckle it. The pain in your arms and shoulders is only multiplying by the second, and you wish to appease it in any way you can. You attempt to rise to your feet and assume a squatting position, backing up a half a step closer to the wall to ease your muscles. Your body moves slower than usual and there’s an odd lurching feeling in your stomach as you balance on your feet. Most likely, you look foolish, and you feel a bit like a chicken entering it’s nest in this position, but it does alleviate the strain. You yank again at your wrists, and the belt tinkles merrily in response. Your neck is stiff and tight, but you manage to glance over your shoulder and see the black leather fiend holding you captive, as well as a second belt fastened to a metal coat hook attaching you to the wall.

  
Well, that’s a tad nightmarish. Perhaps you’ve woken up in the  _ Saw _ franchise. You do wish you could remember the ratio of people that survived in those movies, to weigh your odds and all that. 

There’s the distinct sound of a key in a lock, and the door handle jiggles. You don’t know why but you drop back to your knees, as if somehow too shy to let your  _ literal captor _ see you legs spread and squatted in your skin tight khaki shorts. It’s instinct, you know, but it does make you feel dumb that you did it. And it also makes you feel pain, very distinct pain radiating from your stretched scapula.

The door swings open, and you make eye contact with the man standing there. You’re shocked to find that he’s not the movie villain you were expecting. He is significantly smaller in stature than you are, not quite skin and bones, but getting there. His body is marred with scars and light freckles, off-set by gelled white blonde hair and an odd pair of sunglasses tinged just dark enough to only allow you a faint outline of his eyes. The look on his face is one of disinterest and nonchalance, as if this kidnapping (if that is, indeed, what this is) is simply an everyday occurrence. You feel oddly put out by that.

“You could have a bit more dramatic flair, you know. This is my first capture. It should be special, yeah?” you hear yourself saying, your unnatural, non-regional accent slurring your words into an odd, drunken slush. It’s out-of-body, you’re actually not really one to keep your cool in situations such as these, but you’re proud that it comes out just as you’d always practiced. Calm and collected, unaffected like an action movie hero. Score one for you. 

It only succeeds in making the corner of his mouth twitch, and for all you know that could simply be a tic that has nothing to do with your awesome quip. You mentally adjust your score to half of a point. Fair enough.

He steps towards you after a second of silence, as if he’s making certain you’re finished speaking before he accomplishes whatever he’s come here to do. You try to peer at what is through the door behind him, but the small crack he left open isn’t enough for you to make out anything significant. However, you notice his feet are bare of shoes. Clad in socks only, it’s actually a bit unnerving how silent his footfalls are as he creeps towards you. Upon closer inspection, he’s not quite as skinny as you first thought. He is nowhere near as built as you are, yes, but his lean arms do indeed dip and curve with the outline of muscle. You think he’d probably be faster than you. The sort of strength he exudes is that of a graceful stamina you lack. Harrison Ford hardly has time for dancing around fights like a ballerina, and neither do you. Rather, a gun or two in your hands would even the playing field nicely, if you had to take this strange man on. 

When he lays a gentle hand on your humerus (you think of the pun your grandmother used to make to get you to better remember anatomy, ‘humourous’ — how odd for that to come to you at this moment) you flinch harshly, and he immediately retracts his fingers. His eyebrows raise just slightly over his glasses, before falling back into their blank, expressionless place. He raises the hand again, spreading the fingers and palm in your face like he’s showing a baby that his hand is empty before attempting a magic trick. Then he slowly moves it toward your shoulder a second time, holding your eyes and gesturing with his chin towards it. 

“Mate. Are you...asking me for permission?” Your words come out as an exasperated, awed exhale, noticeably still sluggish, despite your heightened level of alertness.

He nods, but just barely, and says quietly, “Consent is important.” His voice is strange, it’s only a whisper but you can tell it’s deep and twangy in a way that is affected, not unlike your own amalgamation of an accent. It also has this quality of uncertainty to it. You’re annoyed by that. Shouldn’t you be the uncertain one?

“Well.” Your face contorts into a weird half-smile half-frown, humored and disconcerted by the normalcy of this exchange. It’s like a drunk hookup, except you have no idea where you are or who he is or how you got here or what is going on at all. “I suppose I’ll have to withhold my consent, then. Mind explaining to me what’s going on? Having my caboose strung up like a Christmas turkey is quite odd, don’t you think? I’m an understanding fellow, but this is pushing it.”

The man looks away from you, hiding his face and attempting to appear interested in one of the semi-torn posters on the wall. You notice now that the poster is in Russian, unreadable to you but clearly laid out like a film advert.

“Hello?” you ask, irritated at his non-response. “Dangling by one’s scapula is quite uncomfortable. Must I stay like this?”

“I was going to release you, but then you winced like you’d been burned,” he mutters.   
  


“Yes, well,  _ excuse me _ for being afraid of my captor.”

He turns back to face at you, lips pressed together in a gesture of poorly repressed anxiety or anger. “Shut up.”

“My apologies, how would you prefer I refer to you?” You roll your eyes and wiggle again in your bond, listening to the now familiar jangling of the belt buckle. You’re not sure why you’re being so contrary. It’s the sort of mood your grandmother would find endearing, you think, again unsure why she’s coming into your head during this situation. She’s long dead, and you’re long done mourning, but right now you are feeling, in her words, like a mighty shithead. Perhaps you woke up on the wrong side of the predicament bondage. 

The man has been fiddling with his hands awkwardly while you’ve been in dreamland, so you poignantly yank at your ties again.

“Alright, fine. I consent to you untying me, then,” you huff. He inches forward again, and places his palm back onto your shoulder. This time you have enough contact to acknowledge how cold his skin is, like ice against your clammy body. His touch is soft and gentle, making you feel like an animal he’s releasing from a trap, which is surprisingly more pleasant than it sounds. You can just barely hear the sound of him breathing above you as he loosens and releases the belt, dropping you onto your stomach on the bed. An uncontrollable whoop of joy leaves you as you stretch your poor, poor muscles out.

“Listen, Jake,” he starts, freezing the moment your name leaves his lips.

“You know my name?” you respond as you force yourself to sit upright. You rub at the lobster red markings where the leather bit at your wrists and raise a quizzical eyebrow in his direction. You think you see his face flush, just a little.

“Yes, I just-”

“So, are you the gentleman responsible for this?” you interrupt, feeling brave. Obnoxiously, you hold your arm in the air and melodramatically inspect the damage. The dynamic between yourself and this man is bizarre — you can feel the guilt radiating off of him, and it emboldens you to leverage your position. Maybe you can get your ass out of here alive. Maybe the building will blow up behind you while you do. That would be cool. Your head wobbles a bit as you nod to yourself.

“If you would just shut up and let me explain-”

“You don’t seem particularly predisposed to explanation,” you say, sticking the tip of your tongue out at him. It dawns on you to pat your pockets for your Berettas, but you imagine that that wouldn’t be very subtle, and you are still a little freaked by the way this man carries himself (not to mention, the chances that you were even armed before you ended up here are slim, pistols are not widely accepted accessories on the mainland). His posture is rigid, but his expression gives off the feeling of a slouch, which is oxymoronic and nonsensical.

You were correct to be on edge, because he does appear to slightly snap at this, edging his face directly into your personal space in a very threatening way. It causes your heart to thrum in your chest, as if the damn organ mistakenly thinks he may kiss you. You consider the open door, but then you remember how slow of a runner you are. Perhaps Harrison Ford would be more trained in this area than you previously thought.

“I am trying to help you, so if you know what the fuck is good for you, you will shut up,” he hisses in your face. Your jaw drops — what a twist! Obediently, you nod, ready for whatever assignment he’s prepared to get you out of wherever you are. Probably a fortress, or a Russian spy headquarters, given the poster. 

“Why didn’t you just say so, chum! What’s the plan?” you chirp back, trying to whisper but really only barely managing to keep your voice to a low speaking volume. This man looked nice, you knew it from the beginning, he’s far too swan-ish and handsome for a Russian mafia-don or whomever it is that tied you up. You’re getting jazzed now that you know there’s someone on your side. Nervous certainly, but with an undercurrent of excited adrenaline or some sort of similar fuzzy feeling in your stomach. You didn’t spend your entire childhood training on an island alone for nothing.

He puts a hand around your arm, pulling lightly and coaxing you out of the bed and onto your feet. Your legs feel like jelly, wiggling beneath you, and you wonder how long you were out for. Looking concerned (you notice his brows slightly furrowed at the edge of his glasses) he maneuvers you to rest your weight against him, muttering something about “cruel bitches”.

“Bitches?” you say as the pair of you hobble towards the door. He gives you a look.

“How much do you remember, Jake?” 

You think for a moment before raising your shoulders against him in a shrug. The gesture hurts, and you regret it. “I remember about zippity squat, friend.”

He swings open the door with the heel of his foot, revealing a well-lit hallway of similar wooden doorways. Beside each hefty door is a small plate with a number and a letter, and you wonder if that’s some sort of Russian code. The maze like structure of the building looks familiar to you, but the memory is hazy and far away, just out of reach of your conscious mind.

“Well, I’m sorry they did this to you,” he says anyway, tone distracted while his eyes scan the quiet halls. He seems quite stressed.

“Who is ‘they’?” you ask, head lolling against his chilled shoulder. His skin is soft against your warm cheek, so you rest your head there until he starts dragging you again.

“I’m not sure you want to know.” His eyes narrow in on the stair-access door not far from you, and his pace speeds up as he pulls you toward it. “Think you can take the stairs?” he asks as he shoves you into the stairwell, basically answering for you. The pair of you totter down the stairs, not as quickly as he may have liked, but as quickly as your still-wobbly body can manage. Not for the first time, you wonder if the Russians may have drugged you.

“I want to know,” you say, as he finally drags you from the bottom of the stairwell to the building’s exit. It’s cold outside, a light snow falling from the sky and coating his hair and eyelashes in an ethereal way. Your shorts are not the clothing for this weather. Usually you check the day’s forecast before you leave the house. Though you cannot remember what led you into this scenario, you imagine if there had been forecasts of snow, you wouldn’t have worn what you lovingly call (in your head, of course) your ‘sexy shorts’. Maybe you’ve been transported to Moscow.

“Fucking snow,” the man mutters, allowing you to stand upright for the first time since he’d released you. He glares at his socked feet as if personally wronged. You sway a bit, but manage to keep yourself from falling, and he appears appeased by this. “Alright, so — I’m Dirk, I don’t know where you live, but I’d be willing to drive you home. Even in the fucking snow.”

“Dirk,” you say merrily. “My savior, how far might we be from my college campus, perchance?”

“What?” he responds, arms crossed in a failing attempt to protect his already chilled skin from the cold. He looks incredibly confused, his thus far stoic face actually fully expressing his perplexion. “We’re  _ on  _ campus. Shit, you really don’t remember anything at all?”

On the college campus — for a minute you’re in disbelief. But then, when you glance around at the surrounding trees and the snow-dampened concrete, it really does look quite familiar. “Was I in the dormitory then? How interesting.” You hadn’t seen the dormitory before, yourself living in a frat house, but you did imagine that that was what it would look like. Your Russian theory could still be true, certainly, but this does significantly change things.

“What the fuck?” he says, nearly chuckling. He exhales his laugh sharply out of his nose, which is probably close to what must be a full on laughing fit for a man of such monotone. “What did you think happened?”

“Well, my working hypothesis involved the Russian mafia, but seeing as you’re laughing at me…”

“The Russian mafia! Oh my fucking God.” He bites at his full lips, and you find it hard not to stare. “Dude, you got fucking wasted at a frat party and passed out halfway through some freaky shit. The sorority you were vibing with just fucking left you there in my friend’s dorm — bitches — and in an uncharacteristic stroke of altruism I’ve been trying to figure out how to sneak you out undetected all morning. The RA’s would rain down on you like the fires of Hell if they found out you’re drunk and spent the night in a girl’s dorm, whether she was still there with you or not.”

“Oh. Hm,” is the only way you can think to respond. Now that he’s mentioned it, the memories are flooding back to you. An ill-advised game of truth or dare, caused only by your people pleasing tendencies and inebriated state. Dirk drifting in and out of the room, having some sort of exam related conversation with one of the Russian exchange girls. He disappeared early on into the night, and you recall missing his brief moments of presence. You somehow ended up in your compromising position during a giggle-laced photo-shoot, which you distinctly remember feeling uncomfortable, but definitely flattered, during. Until you conked out, of course. Girls aren’t really your style, but being in a fraternity appealed to your need for acceptance and attention, and you’ve seen enough movies to know that getting along with the sororities is a pivotal part of the experience. You now wonder, with a pang of fear, what far corners of the internet those pictures have reached. Maybe it’s for the best that your grandma is already dead, lest she see them and die of a heart attack (she would probably think they were funny -- laugh herself to death, more like).

You also realize, with swelling embarrassment, that you are still sort of tipsy. And Dirk has been dealing with all of this this entire time. Well.  _ That is mortifying. _

At the moment, Dirk looks, bless his weird, stoic heart, nonplussed. Mostly. Kind of. He’s certainly trying.

“Would you like to see the pictures?” he offers, voice wavering with amusement. You shake your head in the negative. You would not like to see the pictures. He does the weird, breathy, nose exhale again, and it’s unfairly endearing. He is your savior after all, and you (and your shoulders) are grateful, whether he was saving you from a mafia kidnapping or an abandonment by some drunk university students.

“Still willing to drive me home?” you ask weakly, already trying to repress 90% of these memories. He leads you to his car. You decide that you would like to keep the memories of him, and focus on specifically repressing any he is absent from. In the grey light of the midday, he does look quite handsome. Perhaps you have a bias towards heroic scrawny weirdos, because you find yourself adding, “I’ll repay you with a coffee, if you’re interested? Interested in both myself, and the coffee, I suppose.”

And as he unlocks his car door, he replies, “Yes. God. Extremely.”

**Author's Note:**

> hi! thank you for reading whatever the fuck this is. i wanted unreliable narrator jake english that is unreliable exclusively because he has a tendency to believe whatever he wants, and by jove this is that. dont mind me.


End file.
